Kurt Pakan

I should really save this post for the dead of Winter but my schedule is the one of the communications industry. I was commissioned to create 3 illustrations focused on how the Eastman School of Music students, feel about their Summers here in Rochester New York, home of the Finger Lakes, Great Lakes, and located [...]

About a year or so ago I was connecting to an old friend of mine from our shared hometown of Tallmadge Ohio. Marty and I played on Tallmadge’s first Little League Team to play in the State of Ohio tournament. Although we lost to a big, tough Youngstown Austin town team, we generated considerable noise [...]

Now that I feel confident in knowing each face, each person, by spending time with their individual image, face, countenance, I can begin to consider the imaginary scene I am about to put together. I say imaginary. I’m sure many would feel this was simply copying a photo bit nothing could be further from the [...]

    I survived the photo session with the family and came away with reference I could actually use. From the photos I have shown on my last post, one may wonder about that. What is really cool about doing a portrait painting is I do not have to have the definitive perfectly lit photo [...]

Once again delving into reflections on images gathered through photos, sketches, bits and pieces, I created this portrait. The graphite drawing was developed from photo reference I took of my wife at the kitchen table after a 12 hour day at the hospital. As a beautiful woman, she is repealed by the focus on the [...]

I was commissioned to create a painting for a poster to commemorate the creation/addition of a new wing to the Eastman Theater, a Rochester treasure. The request was for more of a graphic or abstract approach. I relied on my instincts as a graphic designer as much as a painter. The other issue was a [...]

I had a great opportunity to work with some of the fine people at the Eastman School of Music here in Rochester. I was asked to develop visuals for a real joint venture of dance, theatre, and music for a production of Orpheus and Eurydice, a greek opera being performed at the Harrow East ballroom. [...]

Ok. Its time to stop painting and provide an opionion on the GAP logo dilemma, since branding and identity develop are my specially. Check out this article for background if you have not heard:  debaclehttp://adage.com/article?article_id=146417 I think to really understand a new logo, one must understand the REASON for rebranding. I agree with Alina Wheeler [...]

I’m just finishing my second painting for Bernunzio’s stringed instrument store. Developing an idea for a painting of poster or whatever the application is one thing. Taking that idea and extending it to a series is something else. What is the thread that runs through all the pieces that makes the series a series? What [...]